Mmmm, Floor Pie
I’ve noted before that I’m remiss in reading things my husband G. Grod recommends to me. Last May, he forwarded me a link to an article at Salon about the Five Second Rule. In my defense, I was kinda busy. But a recent spate of articles about the five second rule reminded me that I needed to go back to the article at Salon, and I’m glad I did. I thought it was hilarious. Here’s a quick summary of the latest news on the 5-second rule (5SR):
In 2003, a high school student, Jillian Clarke, dropped gummy bears and pieces of cookie on smooth and rough tiles coated with E. coli. Food was contaminated in less than five seconds.
In April 2007, a group at Clemson published tests of bologna and bread on various surfaces contaminated with salmonella. Unsurprisingly, they found that contamination level depended on the type of surface, and the length of time of the food on the surface.
In May 2007, students at Connecticut College announced the results of their tests of wet apple slices and dry Skittles. They chose the college cafeteria floor as their bacterial environment. The apple slices showed bacteria after a minute, and the Skittles after five minutes.
Harold McGee at The New York Times formulated “the five-second rule, version 2.0: If you drop a piece of food, pick it up quickly, take five seconds to recall that just a few bacteria can make you sick, then take a few more to think about where you dropped it and whether or not it’s worth eating.”
After the Clemson study, Andrew Leonard at Salon saw the 5SR as a parenting tool, an “ability to create, in the person to whom these words are addressed, a sense of proportion and sanity and rough-and-ready competence to deal with the uncertainties and disappointments of life.”
Late to the party but pretending not to be (the Clemson study was published in April, not last month), Monica Hesse from The Washington Post notes that it’s not just about science, but sociology (how gross do you want to look to your friends), biology (how sick do you want to risk getting?), and situational ethics (how tasty is the food, and how nasty is the environment?)
My personal interpretation of the 5SR, which I’ve employed since I had Drake (many people mistakenly assume it’s the type of perspective that comes with a second child) is simply: is there visible dirt? If not, it’s good to go. Not scientific, but definitely practical.